Foreigners

My most recent experience with my new employment digs aside, I've been noticing a trend in the advertising of foreign beers in America. Well, perhaps a trend with foreign premium beers. Chalk it up to inexperience in the American market, creatives or brand managers that don't have a full grasp of the English language, or a "that brand has been selling using this style of advertising; I want to look like that," foreign premium beer brands seem to use the same boilerplate layouts with similar lines about quality and taste. A large glamour shot of the beer in a specially designed glass, phrases like "the choicest hops" and "finest barley." It all melts together.

Before I go on with my unfounded opinions, an aside: The major foreign beer brands like Guinness, Stella, Radeberger, and most others, actually are of high quality that make major-label American beers look like shit. In other countries, especially Germany, they have purity laws that only allow brewers of beer to use water, malted barley (or wheat), hops and yeast. No other additives. In the US, it is much more likely that the major beer brands produce sub-par beers brewed with sub-par ingredients (Budweiser and its rice). Of course, there are the Coronas, Heinekens and Amstel Lights of the international world, whose tastes are about as inspiring as an incoherent, rambling speech from George W. Bush. (Yes. I'm still making jokes at the expensive of W.) That being said, these brands' claims of quality are actually grounded in truth. That aside, their messages tend to be mundane and redundant.

My solution? I don't have one.

My suggestions: Take the time and do more research. Sales numbers and figures that show expanding market share among blah blah blah segments are great. But the American beer market is crowded with about 1675 microbreweries, all touting high-quality craft beer. Now that craft beer has taken America by storm, the major brands are jumping on the bandwagon and trying to introduce their versions of craft beer. (I have no idea how successful that has been, but I know I haven't tried all that many. Don't care how pretty it may look, Michelob's craft beer line is still made by Michelob). Messages about quality ingredients, especially delivered so dryly with the same product shot/glamour shot of the bottle & glass, will not impress much.

Differentiate. Find out where you might fit in. Really get in to what motivates people to try new beer. Is it a free sample? The recommendation of a friend? Promos? Trashing the category leader? Non-childish humor? Savvy, original ideas with exquisite copy? Or idiotic Bud Light/Miller Lite style advertising; or worse yet, the Silver-Bullet Train?

Personally, promos, recommendations and free samples will get me to try just about any beer. It's also great to see a brand beat the category leader at its own game, especially if in doing so it also takes a shot at said category leader. But, if the craft beer movement in America has taught me anything about beer advertising, (it probably hasn't), it's that you don't always need huge advertising budgets to grab a share of the market. The success of brewers like Sam Adams, Magic Hat, Dogfishhead, and many others are evidence of this fact. They all managed to get where they are on word-of-mouth, passion, great sales reps and an excellent product.*

And while you foreign brewers are at it, send me free samples so I can rate your beer and plug it into the phone app I'm developing. Or don't. But, please, do.

*I'm well aware that Sam Adams advertises nationally on TV. It took them at least a decade or so to generate the revenue to do so, though.